R.J. Scaringe

Industry: Transportation

Even amid curvaceous new BMWs and Audis, it was Scaringe and his startup electric-car maker, Rivian, that grabbed the most attention at the Los Angeles Auto Show in November. In a theatrical nighttime unveiling at L.A.’s Griffith Observatory, CEO and founder Scaringe debuted his gleaming silver creation, 10 years in the making. The R1T electric pickup truck boasts more battery range than anything from Tesla, yet it’s fast enough to keep up with the zippiest sports cars (it goes from zero to 60 mph in three seconds). With black hair and black glasses, Scaringe is sometimes compared to Superman’s alter ego, Clark Kent. But Scaringe has long been fascinated with the car industry, from when, as a boy growing up in Florida, he helped a neighbor rebuild Porsches to later working at MIT’s Sloan Automotive lab while earning a master’s and a Ph.D. in mechanical engineering. Now with $1 billion in backing from Ford and Amazon, he’s ready to take on that other genius electric-car-making executive sometimes compared to a comic book hero (or villain)—Elon Musk.